At 5:30 in the afternoon, everyone except Issac had a meeting in Ray’s room. The others were confused, to say the least.
“Why’d you call us here?” Ethan asked.
June sat unsteadily on the sofa. She shifted her weight left and right. She somehow felt uneasy. But she still waited for what Ray would say.
Ray distractedly answered Ethan’s question, “Wait, I’ll answer your questions a bit later.”
The other three looked at one another. Each of them was more puzzled than the last. Soon, a march of footsteps sounded from outside the door. The doors swung open. With two attendants on either side, the Queen entered. Her expression was unusually dark and heavy.
She strode forward and asked Ray, “How did you know about this? Do not joke about this. This topic is very important for us.”
While Janet was a bit slow on the uptake, June and Ethan instantly understood and looked at Ray in horror.
“Ray, you-” June was about to shout at Ray, but a sharp glare from the Queen shut her up.
Ray took a deep breath and said, “Issac’s a 『Demon Lord』; I saw it from his status screen.”
“…And he just showed it to you?” the Queen asked, looking like she couldn’t understand such a foolish move.
“We were all showing each other our status,” Ray explained. “And that’s how we saw his.”
“W-Wait!” Ethan interjected, “Your highness, this is a good thing! We have a 『Demon Lord』 on our side. It’ll make the fight much easier!”
Her eyes instantly narrowed, exuding a pressure that made Ethan unable to breathe. She spoke authoritatively, “Listen, Sir Ethan. The only good 『Demon Lord』 is a dead 『Demon Lord』. And no, it is not a good thing. Quite the contrary, actually. We’ve had a human who was a 『Demon Lord』 in the past.”
June noticed an air of uncertainty in the guards behind the Queen, but her attendants seemed steadfast, as though the last line the Queen said was the undisputed truth. So, she chalked it up to being classified information that only the members of the Royal Family and their closest aides would know.
The Queen continued, “And do you know how he turned out? He was the cruelest 『Demon Lord』 to ever exist. Nothing was beneath him. No amount of murder, backstabbing, raping, and genocide was enough to quell his bloodthirst toward humans. And he lived his life as a generous pastor before this- a father of three, a husband to a devoted wife, and a generous friend.” Her voice rose an octave with each word, exuding more and more pressure, “So, no, Sir Ethan! This is not a good thing. It’s a terrible thing. Something that could endanger our peace and bring about a gruesome end to the lives of tens of- if not hundreds of thousands!”
The Queen inhaled and exhaled again. With a softer tone, she spoke again, “We must arrest him right away and put him to death. There’s no other way….”
“No, not that!” June screamed, “You can’t kill him.”
“Yeah, what the fuck? Even if he’s a 『Demon Lord』, he’s still our best friend. Do you think we’ll just fucking sit around and watch as you kill him? Keep dreaming, bastards!” Janet put up a fighting stance.
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“I agree,” Ethan glared back at the Queen, shedding his weak figure a few moments ago, “You kidnap us for your battle and expect us to agree with something like this?”
Ray sighed and took a step back toward his friends, “Unfortunately, Veronica, I’m on my friends’ side on this one. I won’t agree to kill him. Put him on house arrest, imprison him, but I want you to keep him alive.” His figure stood tall and upright. He spoke with confidence and authority that wasn’t inferior to the Queen’s.
Queen Veronica looked at the suddenly valiant group of Otherworlders and hesitated. After a moment’s thought, she exhaled and relented. “Fine, I won’t kill him.” Her words made the others brighten up. She turned around to the guards, “Men! We have a 『Demon Lord』 in our own home! Fortunately, he is weak and unable to use even the slightest bit of mana! Go and capture him. Cut his tendons and send him to Ifrinn’s Abode. Go!” That last name seemed to mean something terrifying to the knights as all of them gasped or sucked in cold breaths of air. However, what really didn’t sit well with Ray and the others was the ‘cut his tendons’ part.
June was about to shout again, but Ray raised his arm and stopped her. With a resigned voice, he said, “…this is the most they can do for us.”
“Why did you fucking tell her in the first place, you asshole!?” June spoke through gritted teeth.
“Since the moment I saw the words 『Demon Lord』 on his status. I had a bad feeling. And you heard the Queen. I was fucking right. I would rather have him unable to move and writhe in agony than to be a person who can’t be redeemed.” The slightly manic look in Ray’s eyes seemed to want to swallow June, and she unwittingly took a step back.
She looked at her other friends for support, but none of them were willing to meet her eyes. They, more or less, supported Ray’s outlook on this. Their only silver lining was that, at least, Issac would be alive. They could visit him from time to time, talk to him, and keep him company.
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Issac opened his eyes inside his room. His eyes began to water, but he stared at the ceiling to stop them. He spoke with a choked voice, “I-Is this what you meant by ‘too far gone,’ Nyx? Is this what I’ve tried so hard to find out all this time? That my friends couldn’t fucking wait to hand me over, not a moment’s hesitation. Not the slightest fucking hint of regret on his fucking face!” His face contorted in anger as tears fell unwillingly. The lights around him dimmed. He had a feeling that something was wrong when Cheryl told him that Ray had called everyone to his room but him.
He used his sleeves to wipe his eyes, but the tears didn’t seem to want to stop. Taking a deep breath, he tried to calm down. “They’re coming for me. I gotta act fast! Fuck!”
He ran over to the window and opened it. He peered below. The tiled roof was inclined in front of him. “That’s good and all. But what the fuck do I do with this? Think, Issac, think!”
But he had no time for that. The deafening march of the knights could be heard from down the hallway. Without a moment’s hesitation, he opened his pouch and brought out the bag of mana bombs. He threw two mana bombs toward the door and put the rest in his pouch. After he sent mana into the Interceptor, he practiced flowing mana through his body again by sending them to the mana bombs. It became much easier for his mana to flow after that, and he didn’t need to expend as much energy to do so.
He grabbed the windowsill and carefully put one leg out after the other. He grabbed the windowsill with all his might and propped his legs against the castle wall for extra support. The uneven brick laying made it so that he had plenty of bricks to put his feet on. He was now hanging onto the windowsill outside the castle like a thief.
“Arms don’t fail me now,” he prayed to whoever would listen to give strength to his arms.
With a loud bang, the door was kicked down. The leading knight yelled, “Demon Lord Issac, come out!” However, there was no one inside. Overcome by surprise, the leading knight couldn’t respond as more knights entered the room. His eyes searched everywhere and finally dropped to the floor, where he saw a black ball rolling around.
His eyes widened as he immediately shouted, “EVERYONE, MOV-” his voice was drowned out by a deafening explosion that shook the room. The sudden jolt made Issac flinch, and he lost his grip on the windowsill. He fell to the sloped and tiled roof below and began sliding down.